Android Has Five New Features Today
Google hasn’t announced an official release date for Android 15 yet, but it’s on its way. We should see a new update arrive on compatible devices sometime in October , bringing with it new features and changes.
Meanwhile, Google published a new post today highlighting five new features for Android phones, tablets, and smartwatches.
TalkBack now works on Gemini
TalkBack is a screen reader designed for blind and low vision users that offers audio feedback for elements on the display, such as icons and text. When TalkBack is turned on, it describes what it selects on the screen, which helps when it’s hard to see the screen yourself.
Google now says its generative AI model, Gemini, will provide audio descriptions of images. According to Google, Gemini will be able to identify almost any type of image on your phone’s display, whether it’s an image in your photo library or a product you find online, and describe the image to you in detail.
Chrome will read it aloud to you
You don’t have to turn on TalkBack on Android to have someone read aloud to you: Chrome will now do it for you. This feature has been in testing for at least the last two months , but Google officially unveiled it today. This talk to text (TTS) option also includes playback controls such as speed, voice, and language. Just ask Chrome to start reading the article for you and customize the controls to your liking.
Music search circle
Two weeks ago, I wrote about Android’s Circle to Search feature, which lets you search for music . The feature, which uses your device’s microphone to analyze music, has arrived on Samsung Galaxy S24 devices , but has yet to arrive on other phones.
Circle to Search for music is now available on more devices, according to Google’s announcement today. Once you have it, you can press and hold your device’s navigation bar (if using the control buttons, press and hold the Home button) and then tap the music icon to start searching. It works for songs you hum or sing yourself, as well as music played from your phone or other source.
Earthquake Alert Extension for Android
Google is expanding its Android earthquake alert system to cover all US states, plus six territories. This feature is based on crowdsourced earthquake detection data: the accelerometer in your smartphone can actually detect earthquake vibrations and report them to Google. When enough smartphones in one location detect these vibrations, it indicates a potential earthquake. No matter where you are in the US, you’ll receive an alert if Google sends one for your current location.
Google has two types of alerts after detecting an earthquake of magnitude 4.5 or stronger: The Attention alert is for lighter shaking and appears as a standard notification. If there is severe shaking, Android will display a full-screen warning with instructions on how to find cover and protect yourself. Horrible, but useful.
New Google Maps features for smartwatches
Finally, Google is also rolling out several new features for Maps on Wear OS. You can now access offline maps on your watch. To do this, first download the map to the connected phone. You’ll then find your offline maps by browsing Google Maps on your watch. You can also search using your voice, and there’s a new shortcut for accessing Google Maps from the watch face.